Fisheries and aquaculture are important contributors to food security and livelihoods at household, local, national and global levels. However, while aquaculture production is growing rapidly throughout the world, particularly in Asia and Africa, many of the world’s fisheries are at grave risk from human pressures, including overexploitation, pollution and habitat change. Climate change is compounding these pressures, posing very serious challenges and limiting livelihood opportunities. Climate change is transforming the context in which the world’s 55 million fishers and fish farmers live and work, posing a major threat to their livelihoods and the ecosystems on which they depend. For millennia, small-scale fisheries and fish farmers have drawn on their indigenous knowledge and historical observations to manage seasonal and climate variability but today the speed and intensity of environmental change is accelerating, outpacing the ability of human and aquatic systems to adapt.
